


Rao Rising

by SideOrderOfGay



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Cross-Posted on Tumblr, F/F, Internalized Homophobia, Period-Typical Homophobia, beause I fucking love dragons, sit tight folks this is gonna be a long one, with dragons
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-12-09
Updated: 2018-12-09
Packaged: 2019-09-14 21:21:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,268
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16920609
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SideOrderOfGay/pseuds/SideOrderOfGay
Summary: National City, 1803: Lena leaves her home in the dead of night to join a mysterious woman named Kara and her rag-tag group of explorers on an expedition seemingly set up to fail: She sets out to find the last Colossus Cryptonii, the Great Sun Serpent, a being thought of by many as just a myth, like her brother Lex all those years ago, before he went missing in the lost kingdom of Krypton. Maybe, just maybe she'll be able to find her brother and bring him home. But the journey to the lost kingdom is long and perilous, and Lena is not the only one keeping secrets about her true motives.





	Rao Rising

_National City, 1803_

 

As the sun sunk behind the horizon, the horrid screeches of the caged creature died down. It still rebelled against its chains, trying to shed its heavy bindings and the muzzle that kept it from spewing fire and embers, but its movements became more and more sluggish and less and less ferocious, until it seemed to accept its fate, curling its leathery brown wings around itself as much as the chains would allow. Its cold-blooded body wasn’t used to the comparatively chilly nights of early spring in National City, since it had been late summer in the southern hemisphere by the time it had been caught in the Outback of Australia.

The _draco australiensis_ , more commonly known as the Australian Banshee, or the Bane of the Plains by those more dramatically inclined, the first specimen that had ever made the arduous journey from Down Under to the United States alive, for purposes of study. Lena tugged her bulky coat closer around herself. Her teeth were chattering. It was a common safety procedure, nocturnal wild dragons were only to be studied during the warmest, brightest time of the day, while a lecture on diurnal dragons such as the Banshee could only ever take place in the hours before dawn, when the night was coldest. Lena had seen the carnage that even one dragon, a much smaller one at that was capable of.

Lena pulled her cloak tighter around herself. It wasn’t because of the cold, National City nights were always mild at this time of year. Rather, she didn’t feel at all comfortable here, pretending to be someone she was not, one wrong word, one slip-up away from scandal.

It had been easier when Lex was still around. He would bring her his notes, sketches he made during lectures, small trinkets like scales and fangs too if he managed to sneak them out. It was him, she mused, who infected her with his passion for the fire-breathing lizards. She could hardly remember him talking about anything else with the same spark, from the very day the Luthors took her in and he dragged her, a scared and lost girl, into his room to show off his trophies and ‘field notes’. The field notes consisted of observations he had made regarding the hive of Rainbowserpents – a _flutter_ of _chromaserpens_ , if one was inclined to use the correct scientific terms - that had formed in the disused bell tower of an old church that had fallen into disrepair. Lena had helped him with these studies until they found out that the serpents really, _really_ didn’t appreciate it when they had managed to free the bell from nesting material and managed to ring it – they had come home with their clothes torn and their skin covered in scratches. Lena’s adoptive mother of course had thrown a fit and forbade Lena from venturing out into the city with her brother without a chaperone by her side, and that was the end of this adventure.

It wasn’t the end of her curiosity though. She found a way to keep up with the newest discoveries of esteemed dracologists, mostly through Lex and his connections, no matter how “unbecoming” it was.

And then Lex had up and gone. He had abandoned his university studies, returned home one last time to say goodbye to Lillian and Lena, and then he was sailing off to Europe with a man called Clark Kent whom he had met at university, his sights set on the lost kingdom of Krypton, to find the last living _colossus cryptonii_. Lena couldn’t believe it, her brother, her logical, scientific genius of a brother, off to chase a myth of a creature that was long extinct, if it even ever existed, with a man he had met mere weeks ago.

And he had left her behind.

She had begged him, pleaded on her knees to take her with him, not to let her rot on Lillian’s estate, to leave together like when they were children studying the serpent hive in the old church. But Lena knew Lex, her stubborn, hard-headed brother. If his mind was set, it was set in stone. So there was nothing she could do but wave while she swallowed back a sob as Lex’s ship left the port.

Nothing was the same after that.

Instead of comparing notes and sketches with her brother, she now had to enrol in universities under false names, excusing the hoarse whisper she reduced her voice to as to avoid suspicion with a cold she couldn’t quite shake, and sweating under thick coats she wore to hide her feminine stature.

The professor gave a lecture on the anatomy of the _draco australiensis_ , pointing out its sharp, crooked fangs, each one as long as Lena’s middle finger, its hide consisting of tiny, sharp scales, making the creature’s hide feel like sandpaper to the touch, and the sharp quills at the back of its head and neck, which absurdly reminded Lena of a porcupine. The dragon’s head twitched irritably whenever the professor used his long metal rod to point out some physical characteristic or other, its crest of quills quivering and producing a sound not unlike an angry rattlesnake, but it made no move to attack one of them or escape its chains. The cold must have had finally settled in its bones.

Lena stayed behind in the shadows as the lecture ended and the crowd of students dispersed. Nobody really payed any attention to her, for most of the students she was just that strange, quiet man who kept to himself. She had heard them talking about her behind her back, at the beginning with malice, thinking she avoided them because of some sort of disdain for them, but the malice quickly transformed into indifference as she did nothing to confirm or deny these accusations. They had come to the unspoken agreement to just ignore each other.

 From the back of the crowd of students she had barely gotten a look at the beast, and for her field notes that just wouldn’t do. She didn’t have her brother’s talent in sketching, sadly, so she had to make do with vivid descriptions. The edges of the courtyard were illuminated by the flickering light of torches, but its middle, where the dragon cage was located, was doused in complete blackness. The dragon was a silhouette against the shine of the torches on the other side. Lena could feel her heart pumping, deep and heavy, as she slowly unscrewed one of the torches from its place in the wall, throwing nervous glances over her shoulder whenever she could hear the rusty metal screech.

She couldn’t help but breathe a sigh of relief when she felt the weight of the torch fall into her hand. She turned, attributing the trembling of her fingers to the relative cold alone, and took measured, hesitant steps towards the creature in chains. With every step the darkness around her parted like a curtain, until the soft glow of the fire touched upon the creature’s skull –

Lena had to bite back a startled scream. It was watching her, it had been watching her all this time as she got closer, its unfeeling, unmoving, unblinking yellow eyes trained on her. She felt pathetic for the immediate response of her body, her heartbeat picking up, her breathing getting shallow, as she felt the primal fear take hold of her muscles and bones. She felt like prey in the stare of this beast.

Lena was passionate about dragons, she lived for the study, in the same way one would be passionate about the study of volcanoes, tsunamis or deadly plagues.

Her fascination was only outdone by her crippling fear of the fire breathing beasts.

The creature stared at her, its cat-like pupils narrowed to cold, malicious slits, its chest, as big as a wine barrel, heaving with every deep breath it took. Its crest of quills rustled.

Lena swallowed. She did not dare move a muscle. Rationally she knew that the dragon was bound, that it had no chance of harming her, but now that she saw it, teeth too large to be hidden by its muzzle, wings flaring as wide as the chains would allow them to, she had to fight against her deepest animal instincts telling her to run, to cower, to hide –

There was a flash of movement that had the cage shaking and the metal chains screeching, and with a startled scream Lena stumbled backwards, dropping her torch. For a second she was convinced the creature had shed its restraints, ready to pounce on her – it would be a quick death, banshees weren’t known to play with their food, opting to kill it with a quick and precise bite to the neck – but the flash of pain she was expecting never came.

She slowly opened her eyes, exhaled a shaky breath.

The creature wasn’t even looking at her anymore. Now, again plunged in darkness since the torch Lena had dropped on the ground had been extinguished, it was harder to make out its shape, but it was clear that something else had drawn its yellow gaze upon itself, which could only mean one thing:  Lena was no longer alone in the courtyard.

She stifled a curse as she slowly backed away, her eyes scanning around frantically for an exit. The courtyard was shaped like a horseshoe, and the only entrance was obscured from sight by the dragon, and if she made a break for it, she would most likely be seen by whomever had entered just now. Out of options, Lena just backed away further until her back touched the damp stone wall, and hoped that much like her fellow students the stranger would only take a quick peek at the dragon and pay her no mind. She held her breath as she saw the silhouette of a tall person wrapped up in what was either a very puffy winter coat or multiple layers of jackets came into view next to the beast.

The stranger didn’t seem in the least bit afraid, coming right up to the cage until nothing but the metal bars separated them from the beast in chains. Lena didn’t know if it was her imagination and the leftover adrenaline making her imagine things, but she was sure she heard the stranger murmur soft words to the dragon in a language she couldn’t understand. The dragon, in turn, cocked its head to the side in a gesture Lena could only describe as curious – no. That was nonsense. She was simply interpreting meaning into meaninglessness, like seeing faces in the pattern of old wooden boards or the shapes of animals in the clouds. The stranger dug one hand into the pocket of their coat, producing a small object, made of metal by the way it glinted in the torchlight. It almost looked like a key.

But there was no way.

There was no way in hell anyone could be that stupid, to have such a blatant disregard for their own life –

The stranger inserted the suspiciously key-shaped trinket in the key hole on the cage door. And that was when nothing could keep Lena in the shadows anymore.

“What are you doing, you fool?!” she shouted, before the stranger could open the cage door and unleash a feral dragon onto National City. The sudden noise and movement seemed to break whatever trance the dragon had been in, as its rage at being kept in chains seemed to reawaken and it tore at the restraints with all the strength its weakened body had, screeching bloody murder.

The stranger turned on their heels – _her_ heels, as Lena could see now, the stranger was an unusually tall woman with a mane of blond hair threatening to escape from where it had been hidden under a woollen hat - her expression more befitting to a child caught with a hand in the cookie jar than a woman about to unleash a dragon onto an unsuspecting city in peaceful slumber.

The woman quickly stepped between them, in the manner of a teacher trying to separate two quarrelling schoolchildren, and addressed the caged creature in a soothing, low voice. Lena temporarily lost the ability to speak in the face of such absurdity. Distantly, she began to wonder whether she had fallen, hit her head and slipped into a feverish dream.

“Shhh, shhh, don’t be afraid, nobody’s trying to hurt you, the pretty woman is just as scared as you are, we’re all just a bit spooked, no need to make such a spectacle of yourself...”

The beast’s chest heaved with the heavy breaths it took, its wings still flared, but slowly, its erratic movements began to slow down. Lena stood, so flabbergasted that she forgot to indignantly scoff at being referred to as ‘the pretty woman’. Being used to being addressed as such by rich would-be suitors didn’t mean the words were less of an annoyance to her. But still, she had just watched a woman calm down a wild dragon who could have killed them effortlessly, so when the woman continued to coo at the dragon (“...see? It’s all fine now, nobody got hurt, nobody has to scream, that’s a good boy...”), she heard herself saying: “Girl.”

“Huh?” the stranger asked, turning towards her once more.

“This is a female, easily identified by the quills on the back of her head”, Lena rattled off.

And, to Lena’s surprise, the woman let out a giggle. “I’m so sorry, old girl, that was so rude of me”, she grinned towards the dragon. It didn’t seem to care either way, continuing to stare at the blonde, who didn’t seem to find this disconcerting in the least. Lena shook her head as if to clear her thoughts, deciding to concentrate on the most pressing matter:

“What in God’s name do you think you are doing, opening the cage of a wild dragon?”

The woman looked at her for a moment that seemed to stretch like honey dripping from a spoon, before answering: “I heard her scream. Do you have any idea how scared she is, how confused, how homesick?”

Lena could only furrow her brow. _It’s a dragon, woman, for God’s sake, get a grip,_ she wanted to say. She didn’t. There was something in the woman’s voice, something akin to genuine anguish, as if she were suffering along with the caged creature, that made Lena swallow the words on her tongue.

“So what were you going to do about it? Set it free in National City? Hope it finds its way back to Australia before being put down after causing countless deaths and destruction all over the city?”

“No?” the woman answered. “I mean, yes to the first part, I was trying to set her free, hence the whole key thing”, she jangled a keychain that was hanging from her left wrist. The banshee made a curious sound at the back of its throat. “But I wasn’t going to let her fend for herself here. I have friends that-“

Whatever her friends would have done about the situation never made it to Lena’s ears, for they could hear the distinct, heavy footsteps of several armed nightguards quickly approaching. Apparently the Banshee’s screams had attracted more attention that they had thought.

This could only end badly. Lena could only imagine her mother’s reaction should she be found here, she would probably never let her see the light of the day again until Lillian managed to marry her off to her man with appropriately low standards.

The stranger didn’t seem to share her fear of getting caught. Instead, she reacted, quickly, but also completely irrationally. She inserted the key into its keyhole, opening the heavy steel doors with surprising ease – she had to be built like a soldier under the bulky coat she wore – and helping the dragon shuck off its chains.

Lena stood frozen, rooted to the spot as her mind tried desperately to keep up with the madness that was unfolding before her very eyes. The guards’ voices came closer still, and Lena caught herself hoping they would hurry – between a violent end at the hands of this deadly reptile and life of imprisonment, she’d rather choose life. The beast, however, made no attempt at devouring the blonde woman. It wasn’t docile, not by a long shot, its tail whipping around and its movements becoming more frantic with every chain removed, but it made no move to attack any of them. The stranger kept speaking to it, in the same low, soothing tone of voice:

“Shhh, I know it’s cold, I don’t like it either, there’s a good girl, just keep calm, we’re gonna get you out of here, just you wait...”

She could see the dim light of the nightguards’ lanterns approaching, she wracked her brain in search of a believable excuse as to what the hell she was doing here in the middle of the night with a woman who was currently in the process of freeing a feral Banshee from its cage – with a loud, metallic clatter the last chain dropped to the ground and the creature leapt from its cage, letting out a shriek that made Lena’s ears ring painfully, spreading its brown, leathery wings to their full size, lifting itself up on its hind legs – the small size of the cage and its tight restraints hadn’t allowed it this freedom of movement. The Banshee was the only known bipedal dragon, being more of a sprinter than an aviator, using its wings primarily for delivering one fatal attack to its prey from above and nesting in hard-to-reach places.

The dragon was beautiful in its deadliness, elegant and terrible, untameable, unrestrainable, eyes wild and sharp and cold and –

The blonde swung herself upon its back.

Lena had never fainted before, although she certainly had considered feigning doing so in order to escape dreadful conversations with boring rich men, but she felt like maybe now it would be the wise thing to do. Her mind simply couldn’t possibly endure more of this madness.

The dragon didn’t seem to like this new development as well, bucking wildly, short hoarse shrieks ripping through the night as it tried to shake off its unwelcome rider, but the stranger didn’t seem perturbed by this, continuing to murmur soothing words, and, after several seconds of twisting and twitching, the beast calmed down again, almost as quickly as its fury had begun.

Lena could hear shouts now, the first guards storming into the yard blindly – this was it. There was no getting out of this.

She felt the stranger’s eyes on her, and when Lena met her gaze, she extended a calloused hand.

“Do you trust me?” the stranger asked.

“No!” Lena retorted, decisively. The blonde’s features fell, as if she was genuinely hurt by the notion.

“Oh. That’s not good, because I kind of have a plan, well, I have the beginning of a plan, but it kind of depends on you trusting me.”

Lena scoffed. This absolute madwoman expected Lena to trust her, after she had just let one of the most dangerous beasts known to man loose in National City,  proceeded to ignore everything the scientific community had learned about dragons, and, for reasons unbeknownst to anyone but the stranger herself had proceeded to _mount_ the dragon like a horse or a common drake – _and all that without even knowing the first thing about dragons, even managing to confuse the female for a male_!

 

Needless to say, Lena took her hand.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Shoot me a request or shoot me in general on my Tumblr the-wlw-cafe!


End file.
